Midnight, in C Minor
by orangeflavor
Summary: At the dark hour, the world resets - but some things stay constant. [Sasuhina drabble series.]
1. Hiraeth

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Author's Note: At the dark hour, the world resets - but some things stay constant. Sasuhina drabble series, inspired by tumblr prompts for Sasuhina month 2018. Ranging in genre (though I have a penchant for angst). Rating may change. Also not adverse to taking prompts.

Midnight, in C Minor

Chapter One: Hiraeth

 _(n.) a homesickness for a home to which you cannot return, a home which maybe never was; the nostalgia, the yearning, the grief for the lost places of your past_

"I'm home," Sasuke says as the door shuts behind him.

She doesn't answer. Hasn't answered for a month now. Condolence cards are still scattered across the kitchen table where he left them, untouched. He keeps her picture by the family altar, behind a closed door he doesn't think he may ever open again. They've already washed the red ink of his name, as the remaining living spouse (if 'living' is what he can call it), from her gravestone – but some things remain.

Things like her half-finished greenhouse out back, and her favorite porcelain tea set, and the jade hairpin Hanabi gave her on their wedding day.

Things like her old shinobi sandals, still sitting along the genkan, one on its side, both with toes pointed away from the door, as though she has just rushed home and hurriedly slipped them off before crossing over the entryway step.

His throat constricts suddenly, and he has to brace a hand to the wall, lowering himself until he sits along the step of the genkan, staring at the worn sandals.

The house is still full of her.

Tenderly – with his fine-boned, rough-knuckled hands – he reaches for the overturned sandal and rights it, turning it around so that the toes are pointed to the door. He does the same with the other one, and with the delicacy of an attentive husband, he makes them ready for Hinata.

"I'm home," he whispers again, his voice catching.

He never stops waiting for her answer.


	2. Winnow

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Midnight, in C Minor

Chapter Two: Winnow

 _(v.) to separate or distinguish valuable from worthless parts_

His first thought is that she's not much of a shinobi. His second is that she's vain.

It's that long hair of hers. Impractical. An easy grab-hold for an enemy, a distraction on the field, a hindrance to her sight the way it whips around her when she's in motion (though he should have figured that one out better, Byakugan and all).

Hinata parries her opponent's katana with a kunai, her other hand jabbing between the man's shoulder and collar bone, closing the tenketsu point, and just as he shudders from the force of it, arms buckling, a ragged cough bursting forth – she whips around with a kick aimed for his jaw and Sasuke sees it.

Even her hair is chakra-lined, edges sharp and searing, and from this distance he can see the shallow cut it slices along the man's cheek as she spins.

She dispatches the rest of her opponents in moderate time, and Sasuke has a chance to watch her wipe the blood from her kunai along the grass before she straightens and pockets her weapons, eyes steady on his.

"We should move," she says just softly enough for him to think she's looking for approval, or maybe clarification. Or maybe it's just those damn Hyuuga manners and he can't decide which one it is in enough time to think of a response, so he simply grunts his agreement and walks purposely past her, resuming their route.

Hinata falls into step behind him, silent once more.

He still thinks she's not much of a shinobi.

(But his third thought is to glance back just once – _just once_ –)

That midnight hair still sways dangerously and then he is void of thoughts completely.


	3. Madrugada

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Midnight, in C Minor

Chapter Three: Madrugada

 _(n.) the moment at dawn when the night greets the day_

"I'll return with the rain," Sasuke tells her.

It is already a lie.

Hinata stretches her hand out to catch the falling raindrops from the edge of her porch. Naruto will tell her nothing, but she can hardly blame her Hokage. There is no sharing of mission details, and while the shinobi in her quietly respects that, the lover in her still reaches for Sasuke at night, nails digging into the mat when only emptiness greets her.

Her father tells her to be patient. Her sister tells her to be indignant.

Most mornings, her mirror tells her to be kind to herself. She is slowly learning how. Even still.

It has rained twenty seven times since his promise.

She doesn't pass on missions anymore. Her flak jacket fits just the same, her palms are still just as callused, her kunais have not been lead to rust (this she could never abide). In the distraction of duty, she loses some of her tender rage (though not enough).

She still sets the table for two, watching the untouched bowl of rice slowly cool before the empty seat in front of her.

Her father stops telling her to be patient. Her sister stops telling her to be indignant. Instead, they cast their pitying gazes on her in silence as the months pass. No one has the heart to tell her that it wasn't a lie he left her with, only…a promise he didn't get the chance to keep.

"He will come with the rain," she tells herself, eyes to the sky, lips a thin line, and they shake their heads as they turn from her.

In the end, it _is_ a lie.

Because he comes to her with the sun – bloody and bandaged – in the moment the dawn breaks over the earth, his shadow stretching long and unreachable behind him. Her eyes flit briefly to his missing arm, to the hard lines around his mouth and eyes, to the limp in his gait when he makes his way to her just outside the Hyuuga compound.

"Liar," she expels on a tremulous breath, the bag dropping from her hands, the tears already lining her cheeks, when he slides a hand into her hair and brings her face to his.

It's his sob against her lips that jars her into movement, her hands reaching for his shoulders as her knees give way.

It has rained twenty seven times since his promise, and it will rain a million more.

Still, he returns. As dawn always does.


	4. Tacenda

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Midnight, in C Minor

Chapter Four: Tacenda

 _(n.) things better left unsaid; matters to be passed over in silence_

"Do you still love me?"

He asks it across the table from her, so that her hand stills with chopsticks over her plate, her other hand holding the sleeve of her white kimono back, effortless in her grace.

Sasuke curls his hands into fists in his lap. Around them, the cheerful noise of the wedding is in full swing, but he has no mind for it. He has only this:

"Do you still love me?"

He doesn't know which is worse anymore: that she doesn't, or that she does.

He asks again, because she has been silent for too long, and maybe this is her answer after all and he is simply too stubborn to accept it.

But Hinata has only a blank look for him, only a thin press of her lips when she glances up at him. She stares at him with those white eyes, those fucking _endless_ white eyes and then she blinks, because suddenly her new husband is approaching the table, her name lined with affection on his tongue, and her chopsticks clatter to the table, her sleeve brushing carelessly along the plate, grazing the food, and Sasuke has bile at the back of his tongue as he stands swiftly, his chair scraping against the floor but she is already standing herself, already turning to her husband and Sasuke stops.

("What would you have me do?" he growls at her ear, the news of her impending wedding still simmering in the air between them. He grips at her hair, curling into her even as she keeps her hands between them, splayed against his chest, pushing uselessly. "What would you have me _do_?" he asks again, this time desperate, this time trembling.

"Look away," she tells him, resigned, tears already hot against her lids. She kisses him and never forgives herself for it.)

Hinata turns from Sasuke now, eyes downcast as she reaches for another man's arm.

He is staring at the stain along her sleeve for longer than he knows is proper but the man across the table doesn't seem to notice, not when he winds his arm around her waist and pulls her to him and suddenly that bile at the back of his tongue is a churning sickness in Sasuke's gut.

 _"Look away"_ she had told him. He never does.

Because her wedding kimono will always be stained now, and he understands her well enough to know she hasn't the heart to wash it out.

It is the only answer he will ever receive, after all.


	5. Novaturient

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Author's Note: I apologize for the delay. My computer has crashed and I've lost a lot of recent writing, including already written drabbles for this series. Falling back down the ladder hurts like hell.

Midnight, in C Minor

Chapter Five: Novaturient

 _(adj.) desiring or seeking powerful change in one's life, behavior, or situation_

They are less than a mile out from the Konoha gate when she says the first non-mission oriented thing in months.

"You don't sleep well, do you?"

He is so abruptly confused by the question that he stops instantly, turning back to her (she is always five feet behind and he doesn't know why, nor cares to find out). "Excuse me?"

She stops as well, her hands grasping themselves before her, eyes shifting to the floor. "Whenever I'm on watch, you…you have nightmares."

And then he's snarling, moving toward her (she doesn't take a step back and somewhere in the back of his mind he is thrown once more).

He doesn't need to speak though, because when he stops just before her, eyes livid, his whole bearing a threat, she hears him well enough.

And even still, something tells her to press this. "I can help."

His eyes narrow so quickly she almost misses it. If this was anyone else, she could delve into the details. She could explain how chakra manipulation can regulate sleeping cycles, how she can essentially force a resting state. She could reassure him of his safety, she could even walk him through the process using her own pathways. She could do a lot of things, if he wasn't Uchiha Sasuke.

But he _is_ Uchiha Sasuke. And that means she stops short at "I can help", because anything past that is inconsequential. Either she has him with this, or not at all.

(She still doesn't know why it matters so, but she likes to think her clan – no, _Neji_ – taught her better.)

"Why?" he asks her lowly.

She furrows her brows at the question.

"Why would you want to?" he clarifies, frown deepening.

Her eyes blink wildly, her mouth parted, and this is when Sasuke understands.

"Why wouldn't I?" she offers as an answer.

This is when Sasuke understands –

not all things tender were lost in the war.

She stops at "I can help", because he doesn't need anything else, he finds.


	6. Internecine

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Author's Note: Yes, I've upped the rating. You're welcome.

Midnight, in C Minor

Chapter Six: Internecine

 _(adj.) mutually destructive_

"This isn't what you want."

Hinata frowns when he says it, her eyes boring into his shoulder blades. He never looks at her these days - not since their last training session. Not since it ended with him atop her, kunai discarded, his hands at her wrists, and the way he stared down at her, panting, heated, eyes flicking between her lips and the brace of collar bone only barely exposed by her loosening jacket just a moment before she groans her discomfort, shifting a knee along his thigh, her back arching almost imperceptibly and she stills at the breath he sucks between his teeth. Her lips part in an attempt at protest but she doesn't get the chance, because then it's his mouth pressed to hers and it's hard and it's fumbling but it's _hungry_ and it very nearly scares her (it very nearly would if she hadn't deftly moaned against his tongue - if the sound at the back of his throat in answer hadn't thrilled her beyond recognition).

No. He would look at her after that.

Hinata purses her lips in finality. "Then why am I here?"

He turns then, just slightly, just enough to catch her gaze over his dark shoulders, and if she was smart enough she would stop here. She would stop this very second, turn and leave through the door she came, never visit his house again, never remember the heat of his fingers grazing her thigh or the wet press of his tongue in the hollow of her throat.

But Hinata is not a smart girl. Not about the right things, she thinks, or maybe it's the wrong things, but she doesn't care at this point, because she's _tired_ of not being this kind of girl.

The kind of girl that knows exactly what she wants.

The kind that gets it.

"This isn't what you want," he repeats, this time lower. This time a warning. He says it as he turns fully to her, stalking up to her.

She doesn't back into the table behind her, though some part of her wants to.

(But she is also tired of being _that_ kind of girl.)

Hinata frowns in mild indignation, swallowing thickly. She breathes in slow, deep - exhales just as purposely. "I know exactly what I want, Uchiha." The words come out more sure than she expects, but she doesn't let the surprise linger on her face. Instead, she steps into him, the promise of his proximity catching the breath in her lungs, and he doesn't stop staring at her, eyes dark and narrowed, even as his breathing deepens. She is close enough to count his eyelashes, close enough to catch the tight clench of his jaw, close enough to feel his heated breath on her cheeks, close enough to touch -

But Sasuke catches her by the wrist before she can finish raising her hand to his cheek and she thinks maybe this is it, maybe this is the moment he laughs at her, scoffs his amusement, runs her out of his house with a mocking 'Next time try the dobe' and her throat tightens reflexively, her hand curling into a loose fist lest he see her trembling and she takes that hated step back, her hair gliding back over her cheeks and he -

Sasuke is instant, hands hooking beneath her thighs and raising her up, dropping her back onto the table behind her roughly, her hands instinctively grasping at his shoulders to steady herself as she yelps in surprise and then he's pressed into her, right there between her legs, yanking her hips back to his with a growl.

Hinata blinks wide eyes up at him, her cheeks flushing, but her legs are also simultaneously closing around his hips and when he runs a hand up her side, thumb grazing her breast, the excited gasp that leaves her makes him hiss in impatience.

Just before he dips his head to hers, he stops, fingers digging into her hip, his tongue flicking out to wet his lips. "This will not end well, Hyuuga," he pants against her mouth, a sudden, unexpected moan escaping him when she rolls her hips into his, and he has to slam a hand down to the table to keep himself from bucking into her.

Hinata bites her lip at the reaction, taking a deep breath, and then she winds her hands behind his neck, fingers weaving into dark hair, and braces her mouth at his ear. "Then don't let it end," she whispers bravely, far braver than she feels, but it doesn't matter a moment later.

Because then his hand is gripping her hair almost painfully, and her head is tilted back just before he kisses her, except it isn't a kiss at all, it's more like a demand, and when his tongue slips into her mouth, hot and slick, as hungry as the last time, and when he grinds his hips into hers, his desire apparent, and when he pushes her back against the table, following her down as he climbs atop her, his fingers already tugging impatiently at her waistband, and when he pulls her lip between his teeth and groans her name -

"Hinata."

Her _name_.

She realizes this is precisely the kind of girl she is.


	7. Scintilla

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Midnight, In C Minor

Chapter Seven: Scintilla

 _(n.) a tiny, brilliant flash or spark; a small thing; a barely visible trace_

"You are undisciplined," Sasuke says.

It isn't the first she's heard such words, though it usually comes to her in the low, disappointed tone of her father.

Her father - shoulders taut and brow sweat-lined (that cruelly unmarked brow she has learned to carry as her own burden) - turns abruptly from her to take the artfully painted tea cup from the branch house member's offered tray. The branch house member stays with back bowed just slightly, head down, a supplicant bend to their elbows as Hyuuga Hiashi takes his drink, letting the fragrant tea's steam waft just below his nose before he takes a sip.

Hinata, meanwhile, is panting in exhaustion, knees digging into the fine pebbled courtyard behind her father, her hands gripping at the grass beneath her.

Her Byakugan is still activated, and just beyond the graceful arch of her father's wrist when he downs the still steaming tea, Hinata thinks she can see Hanabi with her fingers curled around the far threshold, a thin lipped smile curling along her prepubescent face as she watches in shadow, and - even further still - there is Neji.

Her cousin's back is to her, braced along one of the many walls separating them, and when he curls his fingers tighter along his folded arms, she knows he sees her, too.

The house of Hyuuga is always watching, even when they aren't.

There is still dirt beneath her fingernails when her father places his empty cup back on the tray, his lips a stern line, and his command of 'Again!' echoes far past any walls she used to consider shelter in this once-home.

Sasuke pulls the band around her thigh tight, cinching the wound closed, and Hinata winces as the pain brings her sharply back to the present. Her mouth stays closed. She has learned to keep agony silent behind clenched teeth.

She stares at him, perhaps too pointedly, because he doesn't look at her - his gaze instead fixed to her bleeding thigh.

If she thinks back on this moment years later, she will remember how his fingers had grazed her knee as they retreated. She will remember how he hesitated before he stood. She will remember how he looked at her without the shelter of walls between them.

"You are undisciplined," he repeats on a sigh, almost a huff of annoyance, his hands on his knees as he pushes himself to a standing position. "But not without potential."

There is no one to watch her fumbling this time - no one but Sasuke.

She discovers, belatedly, that he never hides his gaze.

(The dirt beneath her fingernails just needed a good scrubbing is all.)


	8. Redamancy

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Author's Note: Well, it's been a minute. But I have a laptop again, and hope for more regular posting. Please enjoy.

Midnight, in C Minor

Chapter Eight: Redamancy

 _(n.) the act of loving the one who loves you; a love returned in full_

"I'm… I'm sorry… for what they said." She fidgets with the sleeve of her kimono, glancing back over the garden's bridge at the ongoing Hyuuga banquet, the lights behind the shoji doors oddly comforting even in their starkness.

She supposes home will always be comforting to some degree, even when it shouldn't be – even when her blood has been washed from the stones of the practice courtyard, even when her mother's garden has been overturned, even when her father's room has already been given to dust.

Beside her, Sasuke watches her quietly.

"The elders," she continues, "ever since father's death they've been…" She loses the words, or perhaps never had them. She huffs in mild frustration, eyes leaving the softly lit halls and flicking over the pond beneath the bridge where they stood.

He chuckles then, and it draws her attention. "I've suffered worse than their words, Hinata."

"But still – "

"It is of no matter,"

She is silent then, and somehow that is worse, though he doesn't know why.

They stand staring at the pond for many moments, and in the flash of moonlight along the water he thinks he sees her worrying her lip, but he cannot be sure, and he will not look at her (some hurts he will never admit to).

"You're wrong," she says finally, softly, her throat tightening as she looks to her hands. "It does matter. It matters because I mean to marry you, and I'll not have them speak of my husband in such a way."

Sasuke is reminded of the day she had first pressed her lips to his, a daring sort of hesitance pushing her to stand on her toes, her hands framing his cheeks (too tightly if he remembers correctly) and the quick, wet pressure of her mouth against his, not long enough to intrigue, but enough to startle – and the way she didn't take her eyes from his when she dropped back down, her hands still uncomfortably squeezing his cheeks and he had laughed – _laughed_ – and she had flinched back, mortified, regretful, until he bundled her in his arms and kissed her properly.

She is much more forward than she thinks sometimes, and it's this quiet boldness with her affections that endears her to him far more than any overt touch or daring confession.

He looks down at her finally, though she isn't looking at him, and then he winds his fingers through hers and tugs gently, pulling her into him until she stumbles against his chest, her face braced to his shoulder. He keeps his one good hand in hers, moves his lips to the crown of her head. "Silly girl," be breathes against her hair.

She shifts against him, her free hand rising to brace along his chest, fingers curling into the material of his montsuki. He looks down and has to stifle a laugh at her pout. She's so serious about it though, and he doesn't mean to mock her, so he presses his lips back to her hair and sighs against her, his hand tightening over hers.

"I thank you anyway," he offers, pausing a moment, and then smiling into her hair as he adds, "my wife."

She doesn't answer, only burrows deeper into his chest.

His wife, his wife, his wife.

He catches their reflection in the water. Moonlight has never done her justice.


End file.
